i got an email from someone who didn't like that people could see their "online status" at the bottom of the main forum page, where it shows people currently browsing the board.

i thought this would be a good opportunity to let people know how they can turn this off and control other privacy issues.

When you are logged into the forum, click the "PROFILE" button on top, this will bring you to your forum profile where there are many settings you can adjust.

In the left sidebar you will see there are actually many different pages in your profile, including:

Account Related Settings

Forum Profile Information

Look and Layout Preferences

Notifications and Email

Personal Message Options

If you dont want people to be able to see when you are online, go to the "Account Related Settings" page, and uncheck "Show others your online status?"

How to never receive an email from us ever:

On the "Notifications and Email" page you can turn off all messages from us - so you'll never get another weekly newsletter from donationcoder.com, if you don't want to receive them, though i request people leave this enabled unless they are really opposed to it, as its the way we would let members you know about imporant announcements.

You'll also see an option for "Hide email address from public?" which is set by default.

I should also remind you that if you haven't done so yet, go to the "Forum Profile Information" page and pick out an avatar (image) for your forum identity so people have a fun picture to associate with you.

This would be also a good opportunity to remind people that by default when you sign up you are listed in the "Visitor" group.

Your group is listed after "Position: " on the main Profile page, and at the top of every forum page in the User Info box at top.

After you have made a donation to the site you should be listed as a "Charter Member" "Supporting Member".

If you have made a donation (or if you have contacted me and been told i was upgrading your account), but you are still listed as a "Visitor" then don't panic, it just means i missed you somehow. send me a private message through the forum or email me and i'll take care of it right away.

Ugh.. someone just pointed out that the "Notifications and Email" option was not visibile to non-donating members. It is fixed now.

Why didn't someone point this out to me before?

I apologize to all of those non-donators who wanted to turn off our wonderful newsletter emails for some reason and found these instructions impossible to follow. Please remember you can always email me (mouser@donationcoder.com) if you have any trouble with something on the website.